The Last Word

It's happening again.

This time, I am at Logan Airport in Boston, about to embark on the penultimate leg of my journey home. I'm going to Vegas to hang out with my Auntie Beth for a couple of days and to pick up my car for the road-trip back to Denver. I've purchased a snack and a bottle of water and have settled in to a chair with my book, since – as it turns out – I actually have lots of time to kill (we were worried for a while, Lisa and me, that I wouldn't make it; we'd lost track of time, as we often do, when a cursory glance at my mother's kitchen clock had us scurrying to her car, hurling all 60 kilos of my stuff into the back seat, and white-knuckling it down the Mass Pike all the way to the airport shuttle drop-off). Soon enough, though, the gate attendant's voice is crackling over the PA and it's my turn to board, so I hoist my backpack onto my shoulder, tuck my bottle of water under my arm, and fall in with the other weary travelers shuffling towards the gate.

I am rifling through the pages of my book (it's called Gilead, incidentally – and it's fabulous; you should all read it) for my bookmark-slash-boarding pass when I feel it – a faint but urgent ache, swelling and pressing against my throat like a small but steadily growing tumor. My eyes sting, and the pretty, artificially cheerful gate attendant – her blond hair a golden helmet framing her bright face - blurs in front of me. I blink furiously – I can't believe I'm crying again, and I'm not even sure yet why I am – and I swallow. And then text Lisa. "I'm crying," I type. "I'm getting on the plane and I'm crying. This is it. It's all over now. I'm finally going home."

I take a breath and clutch my backpack closer. I am suddenly tempted to turn around, to hop back onto the shuttle, and retrace the steps I've taken – to go back to New York, back to London, back to Venice and Bore and Paris and London again; back to Joburg and Lusaka, then Saint Francis and Mwandi; back to Zanzibar, Vic Falls, Mukinge, and Chilonga. I could go back, I think, just for a little while, and live it all over again – just so I don't forget.

*****

Except that that's been the point of this blog, I guess. To write it all down so I don't forget. To chart the course of my grand adventure and leave you, now, with a final thought. But where to begin? I mean, the truth is, nothing about the last eight months went as I expected it would – or, frankly, as I thought it should. And I spent a lot of time while I was over there – indeed, too much time – lamenting this fact. I was embarrassed, even, that I didn't have better stories to tell, or more tales from the trenches. But now that it's over, none of that seems to matter very much.

There were challenges, to be sure, and frustrations and disappointments. And there were times, I will tell you, when I felt more lost and more alone than I have ever felt in my entire life. But when I think back on these last eight months, it is not feeling frustrated that I remember; it is not feeling embarrassed or lost or alone.

When I think back on these last eight months, I think of Victoria Falls, and of soaring – weightless and free – for four gloriously insane seconds; or of the Tanzanian countryside, the dappled sunlight reflecting off acres of sunflowers and shining black faces smiling up at me as the train blurs past; or of Maggie, and her Irish husband who-loves-her-so-much, and the 40,000 kwacha she collected to buy two tired and hungry muzungu strangers lunch. I think of Robb and Sanjiv and the rest of the IHV team; the missionaries at Mwandi; and the med students at St Francis.

I think of Dorica, clapping and screeching with joy when comprehension dawns on her face; and of Jonathan bowing his head and saying thank you; and of Thomas and Temba and Jakob and Stan; and the way dawn and dusk always came on so quickly it was like God just flipped a switch.

And then I think of Kondwani and her perfect pink lips, her mocha skin, and her tiny fingers clutching at the neckline of my shirt; and of the way my brother – who has always been my rock, the one on whom I've counted to carry me and help me find my way – finally allowed himself to need me, and dared to trust me, for even a little while, with the care of his most treasured gift.

I think of all these things – and so many, many more – and I know that I am blessed. And I am deeply, profoundly grateful – and I haven't even started talking about Europe yet. :-)

"Do you even realize what you've gotten to experience these last eight months?" my father asked me last week, shaking his head and squinting at my computer monitor. We were looking at some of the pictures I'd taken while I'd been gone. Do I realize what I've gotten to experience?? I'm almost offended that he's even asked. Does he really think I don't?

I bungee-jumped off the second highest bungee-jump in the world. I saw more of Zambia than most Zambians do; stared a lion straight in his limpid, amber eyes (from the safety of a Jeep, of course, with a trained game driver at the wheel); and lived for two weeks in Tanzania and Zanzibar on less than $15 US a day.

I watched the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace; stood where Anne Boleyn was beheaded; took a train through the French Alps; and stumbled into Sacre Coeur – completely and totally by accident, I should point out (I'd gotten lost on my way to dinner) – and was so overcome by the beauty of it, I literally sat down and wept. I saw Notre Dame, Doge's Palace, the Musée D'Orsay, and the Tate Modern. I watched a show at the Old Vic and a concert in the Palazzo di San Marco. I saw the Paris Opera, London Bridge, the Eiffel Tower and Saint Chappelle.

I drank homemade wine with every meal in Bore; kissed a Frenchman on the streets of Montmartre; danced with an Italian under a starlit sky at San Rocco; and got drunk with a bunch of Aussies, a couple Germans, two Canadians, and a Dane in London.

I had the time of my friggin' life.

But now it's over. And I'm boarding the plane for Vegas, where I'll pick up my car and head home. And just as it did when I left Lusaka, London, Bore and Paris, the ache presses against my throat and I falter. I look behind me. I could go back, I think, just for a little while, and live it all over again – just so I don't forget…

*****

To all of you who sent emails or comments while I was away, or who simply stood beside me and labored through the reading of this blog as I labored through the writing of it – from the bottom of my full-to-bursting heart, I thank you.

Uishi salama.

Picture: Me and Stan